


Panic Bear

by bonehandledknife (ladywinter), Primarybufferpanel (ArwenLune)



Series: The Mountains Are The Same [31]
Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Because the Citadel used to be an awful place, Depression, Fanart Welcome, Frottage, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Internalised Racism, Multi, Podfic Welcome, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-18
Updated: 2015-11-18
Packaged: 2018-05-02 06:25:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5237807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladywinter/pseuds/bonehandledknife, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArwenLune/pseuds/Primarybufferpanel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Panic Bear: A panicking novice climber clinging to handholds while searching desperately for a foothold.</p><p>
  <i>After the prior days sharing quarters he was beginning to grow used to the nightly rustlings of these people dreaming, snoring, getting elbowed into turning over, fighting for blankets, and sometimes sleepily patting each other to soothe a bad dream. This was different though. Rhythmic. </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Panic Bear

Max wished he could stop thinking about the sound of Furiosa, moaning. Wished he could stop picturing Austeyr's large hands spanning her shoulderblades, thumbs pressing deep into the muscles. He'd been so unsettled by Austeyr and Furiosa, or rather, by what he'd thought they were doing, by how she'd looked relaxed and comfortable pressed into the mattress like that and how he'd felt his body responding to it, by the sense-memory of her body under his own in such a different context, that he'd retreated to the cushion on the ledge to sleep instead of letting himself fall wherever on the mattress. It had seemed safer. 

Then the next day, moaning actually  _ was  _ that kind of moaning. 

After the prior days sharing quarters he was beginning to grow used to the nightly rustlings of these people dreaming, snoring, getting elbowed into turning over, fighting for blankets, and sometimes sleepily patting each other to soothe a bad dream. This was different though. Rhythmic. 

Max slowly became aware of elevated breathing, soft rustling. He opened his eyes and it took a moment to sink in what he was seeing below him on the mattress, the sparse moonlight coming in through the window making the shapes hard to decipher. 

When his eyes had adjusted Max could see that Kompass was pressed up against Furiosa’s back, hips grinding slowly against hers, one arm over her waist. In front of her, Ace had one heavy thigh between hers, and his face pressed to her throat.

Max might wonder about this more if she weren’t facing him, eyes closed and head tilted back in clear enjoyment. Her hand was on the back of Ace’s neck, and he could see the flex of her fingers digging in in encouragement.

It looked lazy, like they were all still half asleep, like it had required no thought or negotiation. And okay, he wasn't  _ surprised,  _ as such. They'd all seemed to have the kind of ease with each other’s nearness that this didn’t seem such a far step.

He wasn't surprised to feel his own body responding, either. It had been a long time since he'd had the energy or inclination for anything but grim survival, but the past week or so had involved more water, food, sleep, and relative safety than any time he could remember. 

What was surprising Max was that he didn’t feel awkward. It was a little strange to be seeing this, but he didn’t feel like he shouldn’t be here, like he wasn’t supposed to witness it. They were unselfconscious about being seen, and he knew he could turn around on the ledge and ignore it, but he ended up watching despite himself. The sight of Furiosa’s face, a little flushed, her lips parted, made him feel lightheaded.   

At some point Austeyr, who’d been asleep tucked behind Kompass, woke up enough to sleepily reach across his fellow crew to put a hand to Furiosa’s side, stroking slowly, as if just wanting her to know he was there too. Max blinked to find his hand twitching with the same urge - not to  _ do  _ anything, but to be there, to share in this moment somehow. To be there like he'd been yesterday night, unplanned, unthinking; tucked between bodies and curled up in the relaxed, animal warmth of several other people. 

He resolutely turned his back to the strange scene and tried to ignore the tiny, gasping moans Furiosa was making. A few minutes later she gasped sharply, voice gone thready, and then calmed. There were a few more moments of rustling, and then groaning as the men come too, and things slowly grew quiet again, breathing slowing down.

Max tried hard not to picture them, sleepy and sated and curled into each other, and failed miserably.

 

* * *

 

He had the uneasy feeling that he ought to be doing something, and that put every instinct he possessed on high alert. Then there was the memory of dinner, of how he'd ducked his head in close and she'd held her ground, not in challenge, just… amused. Interested? He'd  _ licked  _ her, for fuck's sake, on impulse, and the taste of her skin had kicked over tables in his head he couldn't manage to right. Especially not after seeing her under her crew's hands this morning, the sounds she'd made, the way she'd pressed into their touches. The way he was suddenly imagining she might feel under his own touch, strong and warm and humming with pleasure, and... 

He eventually washed up in the lookout post on the West tower, using the big scope there to look back over the route the warparty had taken. Were more cars coming, just slower? Had they split up on purpose? It hadn't seemed that grandstanding Imperator's style to show up with less than his full force, but the thought bothered Max. 

Janey found him up there.

"Same worries, I see," she sighed. He hummed and offered her the scope, having long seen what there was to see. "I want to send an expedition to see what there is, people, salvage, anything, but…" she murmured, focused in the distance. 

"Can't, mm, exactly send out men now, huh?" Max supplied. With the newly arrived warboys and some of their own injured, they couldn't afford to send out the reliable warboys. 

"No..."

"Want me to go and, uh, have a look?"

He wished he didn't feel so relieved when she nodded but even the  _ idea _ of leaving made him feel steadier, more in control.

 

* * *

 

Rachet had been ordered to rest in quarters, but at least he was allowed to work on projects - not that anybody but the Boss would have been able to stop him. She was there also, resting up from her injuries still. The wounds on her ribcage were healing well, from what he heard then Miss Gale checked on them, but twelve days was still not very long at all to recover. It was easy to forget it hadn't been longer; so much had happened. 

Max had come in earlier to let her know he’d be out for a few days scouting. She’d sighed and nodded like it was almost expected. Rachet had gone back to his tinkering and she’d eventually gone back to reading a book one of the Tribunes had brought her. Furiosa was midway through, finger tracing over the paper and lips moving soundlessly, when one of the new Vuvalini knocked on the door. Rachet hadn't figured out if her name was Vicky or Vicks. 

"Can I come in, pet? I'm not disturbing you and your crew?" she called, and Rachet wondered what she was expecting to find that she took such care not to disrupt. 

Furiosa was sitting in the window ledge, leaning comfortably against some cushions. The other woman sat down next to her, rubbing at her own knee. Rachet remembered that she was still recovering too. 

"I just learned that this…" she began, and then took a coiled up something from her bag. Offered it to the Boss. "Val's. She would have wanted you to have it."

Rachet watched curiously as the Boss reached out to accept, and it uncoiled in her hand - it was a belt, intricately tooled and obviously well-used. 

The other woman seemed to wait for a response, but the Boss' face had gone still. After a long moment the Vuvalini just said "I'd like to tell you more about her, when you're ready to hear it, pet. I remember you were close."

"Shine, Boss," Rachet said, gesturing at the belt. “Good work too, know who did the detailing?"  

"Valkyrie. She was one of our people." Rachet caught the Vuvalini woman turning to him from the corner of his eye.. 

“Oh! Yeah I remember that name from Tenday, she went chrome and well Witnessed,” Rachet said considerately.

The woman gave him a look he couldn't decipher. 

"Sad though.” Rachet tried, wondering if using such a soft word was proper here, but it seemed to be used often in their stories and maybe it was like the difference between shop-talk and war-talk and plain talk, maybe it was just the way they talked? He traced the details on the belt with his eyes, “Would have liked to ask her to show me tooling like that."

"You would have learned from her, would you? Even though she was not a Warboy?" The woman was looking at him intently.

"Of course! Ain't got so much time that I'd turn down the chance to learn shine stuff.” Rachet shrugged as she leaned back a little. He went back to trying to sort through some piping and some joins that will be needed to repair the Boss’ arm.

“In the Green Place we used to call home, we’d have skill circles where many young ones could learn and practice such craft all at once.”

“Not trainers? Apprenticeships?” Rachet pondered, not looking up.

“Only when they got old enough to know where they wanted to go with their knowledge. Before then everyone got taught a little of everything, Val and Furiosa here was in a group together.”

“She must have been shine then,” Rachet decided, given how Furiosa is, that no one but the best would have kept up, “Isn’t that right Boss?”

Rachet turned towards Furiosa when she didn’t answer and blinked, suddenly uncertain.

“Boss?”

Her face was oddly stiff, even now. And the Vuvalini glanced at her and then it’s like all the air was taken from the woman’s face, like a weird deflated tire.

"Oh pet, I am  _ so  _ sorry. Don’t be like th— She thought the possibility of a new Green Place was worth the risk, even if she might not get to see it. She wouldn't want you to regret it. Did you ever get a chance to talk about how you two—" She seemed to grew more halting with every word, looking at something on Furiosa’s face. “Oh maybe I shouldn’t have…” She shifted her weight again, “Do you want to be alone?"

“I…” And Furiosa drifted her word off in a strange way, like she hadn’t finished deciding how to finish her sentence. She sounded croaky, like her throat was bein' squeezed. 

“You never did get a chance to breathe all these days, did you?” The older woman nodded firmly to herself and stood up, “Don’t you worry, we’ve got everything handled. Take as much time as you need.”

Then she leaned in and touched her forehead against the Boss', lightly, not like a proper headconk at all, and left, giving Rachet’s good shoulder a bewildering squeeze as she went. 

The Boss' jaw was clenched, and she drew breath with an odd sound. Rachet looked at her with alarm. Was there something wrong with her lungs again? And what did that woman even think she needed to take time for?

He got up to sit next to her after setting down the arm, unsure why he was doing it. He had the feeling she needed something from him, but he didn't know what it was. He'd still try, though. He always did. 

"Val was... your friend?"

Furiosa made a painful sounding noise and blinked rapidly, looking out of the window without seeing. 

"Val was your crew?" 

That made more sense, if the Boss was this upset. There were a few crew members what she missed more than most - Rachet knew there were still moments Sprocket was on her mind. He didn't understand how somebody she had met on the Fury Road could have taken such a place so quickly, but the hitch in her breath said that she had. 

And if the Boss had known this Valkyrie while they were pups, that was a whole ‘nother deal.

“She… she went out chrome though. I heard it myself at Tenday.”

Furiosa covered her face with her hand. 

“It’s okay,” Rachet continued, a little helplessly, “I promise I heard it. It was Witnessed.”

She curled up around her middle like something had ripped her open, and Rachet reached out without knowing why, hand hovering over her shoulder. He tried to think of what Austeyr would do and rested his hand lightly on her arm.

Furiosa curled into the touch, into him, and Rachet found himself in the odd position of trying to curl around her taller form and not knowing what he was trying to protect her from. He darted his eyes around to check the door and the window, but they seemed secure. He held her tightly because that had always made him feel better and hummed to her as if it was nightfevers or dreams.

It was daytime though, and she was awake, and the nightmare wasn’t leaving her.

Rachet didn’t know what to do. “She was Witnessed,” he said comfortingly, and hoped everyone else came back quick.

She let out a hurt sound and clutched him back harder. 

 

* * *

 

"Hello Ace. Got some time to talk?" 

Tribunes Toast and Dag approached the meal hall table where Ace had just had shared food with a group of warboys eager to be considered for his crew.

"Sure," he nodded, glancing at the warboys still hanging around, and they took the hint and left. 

"How's your new crew coming along?"

"Got some guys, thinking about who to add," Ace said, wondering if they'd sat down opposite him, shoulder to shoulder, on purpose. He hadn't realised the Tribunes would be liable to use this kind of intimidation tactic, but their intense scrutiny made him have to quell his restlessness. 

"We hear you picked Oti," Dag said, with something of sharpness out of proportion with the words. 

"I did."

"Any reason?"

Ace raised his eyebrows. 

"He was brave to do what he did before the siege. And a good fighter. Could use him."

"On your  _ crew _ ."

"...yes…?" he said warily, aware that more was being asked than the words said, but still not sure where this was going. 

"So, you'll be having your crew in your quarters at night, like Furiosa?"

_ What an odd question, _ Ace felt, but he didn’t even know what was odd about it because bringing crew to their quarters was just something that Imperators  _ did _ . "Furiosa originally brought us to her quarters because she didn't want us to be in the Blood Shed," he said, to win some time to think. "Because it wasn't safe there."

“Originally. But she kept bringing you there?”

“ Yes.” Ace said shortly, not wanting to delve into how they, each of them, always felt the sleep to be had there was secret, stolen, something warboys weren't supposed to have, the feeling of your six guarded by many. Not feeling like he could speak for Furiosa on this matter,  _ especially _ given their misunderstandings, but thinking maybe she liked having her quarters so well-guarded.

"What if a crew member didn't want to?" 

"Didn't want to  _ what _ ?" he growled, losing patience with the implications they were making. 

"Sleep with her."

His initial reaction was who  _ wouldn’t  _ want to rest safely piled up in crew, but then realized that the Tribunes might be asking something else. Something darker. So he split the difference and answered both possibilities, "' _ Only if you want. _ ' That's what she said. That's what she  _ says _ , in her quarters."

"And is that what you'll be saying to your crew?" Tribune Toast asked.

"I thought you'd been telling us it was safe in the Blood Shed now?" Ace said.

They stared at each other. The Tribunes looked at each other and then back to Ace, who was growing impatient with whatever it was they weren't saying.  

“ What,  _ exactly,  _ are you asking here?” 

"Other Imperators brought crew to their quarters." Tribune Toast said.

"For - how did they say it? For a  _ Use _ ," Tribune Dag spat. 

"Not like Furiosa.” He said, shoulders feeling stiff, “They brought one or two of their crew up, only. And didn't exactly let them sleep there."

He's always known that wasn't right, even before Furiosa had turned out to be so different, but there had been so much that didn't feel right, the reality of it was only now beginning to sink in. Xe, the War Rig Imperator before Furiosa, had been more interested in the breeders. Ace had always been absently relieved the Imperator’d done so, and it was only now sinking in how that really just meant most of the abuse had been spared the crew to be heaped elsewhere. Imperator Xe had only sometimes taken up one of the new crew members, claiming they needed discipline. In hindsight, that had mostly been on days when his preferred breeders weren’t available.

"We just want to know if you'll be doing that too,"  

Oh.  _ That's  _ where this was going. The idea of treating anybody like Xe had treated them made him feel queasy. He also couldn't imagine taking his own crew to bed like Furiosa because they weren’t—

_ crew.  _

_ Huh.  _ Ace blinked a bit as the irony struck him, trying to figure out why the words felt different in his head.

"Reckon I won't be there much. Wanting to spend time with—" he hesitated. He had no other word for it. "crew and all. Her crew."

They stared at each other for a long moment.

“You realize that doesn’t mak—” Tribune Toast began.

“ Yeah,” Ace interrupted irritably, "I'll have my own crew. That's still my  _ crew  _ though."

Tribune Toast looked down at the table and covered her mouth. 

"So you didn't pick Oti because you can Use him?"

"What? No!” Ace knew that Oti was a favorite of Imperator Prime and frankly easy on the eyes but it’d never much occurred to him to touch anybody who so clearly didn't want to be touched. Not with how nice it was to touch people who enthusiastically wanted to be touched, and touched him right back, even if sometimes a crewmember had been very specific about the sort of touch.

"But you said you could use—" 

"I want him on my crew because he is a good fighter, and loyal to the Tribunes," Ace said, slow and as clear as he could. "And brave, and good at talkin' to people. I need an Ace who talks to people."

“Okay, and you would prefer to be used by Furiosa instead?”

Ace shifted uneasily. "Not Use, exactly. Not like… that. Nice things."

“Never heard of two Imperators bunking up before."

"Never heard of Tribunes at all until a while ago." And yet, here they were. He looked at them pointedly. 

He frankly couldn't even imagine taking Oti up into his quarters, let alone anyone else. Why would he? Especially since it wasn't like he was leaving Furiosa’s quarters and she'd made it clear she’d still like him near, even if Kompass was her new Ace. 

He couldn't imagine that any new crew of Furiosa's would be joining them in her quarters either. The past weeks had forged something out of the six of them, Wastelander feral included, that he couldn't explain. The massive shifts in perception and knowledge recentering themselves into something true, something different, out of the hurts and the shared vulnerabilities and the forgiveness. He'd always seen himself as the crew's protector, but now he also felt— protected? His uncertainties and vulnerabilities guarded and kept safe even if it’d had been revealed to them. It was new and daunting but it made him feel easier than he'd ever had, stronger. 

Even the idea of trying to ‘catch up’ somebody new made him wary and exhausted. 

"So you're gonna have your own crew, and Furiosa's going to have a new crew, but you're also still on Furiosa's old crew?" Tribune Toast said. The corner of her mouth twitched. "Maybe you guys should think of a different word. To stop this confusion about different crews."

"Harem," Dag suggested, as they both got up to leave. “I think we’ve found out what we came to find.”

Ace didn't know what that word meant, but the devious quirk of her mouth made him decide to reject her suggestion out of hand. He’d have to bring this up with the others, maybe one of them could think of something.

But.

But maybe in a little while. Ace felt like he should first figure out by himself where he’d stood on the idea, why his crew and his  _ crew  _ felt so different. And what  _ made  _ it so different. 

He needed to go customize his patrol vehicle anyway.

Maybe spend a little time in the Pits, see if he could find a good scrap, because his balance felt off, right now, for some reason.

 

* * *

 

She felt empty, after the Siege. After everything wound down. After no more was required of her. 

It was exhaustion and the giddiness of surviving, running on fumes. She had been on the mend, but sniping, not to mention going around dealing with aftermath of the Fixer and the Gatekeepers’ deaths, had drained her. Her ribs ached, her breath came short, and all she wanted was to sleep. Sleep and not think of things like belts and tainted arms and the things that Joe ruined. The things and people that she ruined.

All these past seven thousand odd days she'd had goals. Survive. Crawl up to a position with some control. Never let Joe know who she was. Get to the Green Place. Make it back to the Citadel. Make Joe regret everything he'd ever done. Get better. Get well enough to be up and involved. Defend the Citadel…

Now she'd just.. 

ran out. There was no urgent reason that needed her on her feet. There had barely been need for her during the siege itself; the Citadel had come together to defend itself. The women had stood strong with new allies and reclaimed allies, Capable had taken lead with bargaining with the war parties when all she’d said had only caused more fighting.

And it worked.

They made it… easy.

She was safe, as safe as she could remember ever being. Joe was dead, and so were the other Imperators, the Organic Mechanic, the Fixer. More than that, she had her Ace back, and he could even take her place now. She had Max, who'd come to tell her he was going out scouting for a few days, looking out for her from afar. She had her crew by her side. Her six had never been so well guarded. 

She didn't want to move, and there was no compelling reason to make herself. The Council could run the Citadel perfectly fine without her. Maybe even better, without her old ideas holding them back.

She just wanted to sleep. Rachet, still recovering, was happy to keep her company. 

On the second day Gale visited them. She checked on Rachet's wound, finding it healing as well as could be expected. Then she let herself sink to the mattress next to Furiosa, her knees clicking, giving an update on what the Council was doing. 

"We had a good talk with Corpus this morning.” 

Furiosa just hummed her attention, but she was not even sure she really needed to know. It seemed a bit ungraspable, distant and cloudy, and there were other people taking care of it.

"We've gone down to talk and the first five of the war party have come up. Ace is a big help." She chuckled. "That man knows everybody. We're splitting them up over the towers much as we can."

Furiosa hummed in acknowledgement, not managing to scrape up much interest. 

"Got me a little worried, my girl. Thought you'd be up and at it by now."

"Just tired," Furiosa mumbled.

"All right," Gale said after a pause, "I suppose you have a lifetime to rest up from."

Gale's warm, weathered hand lightly petted Furiosa's hair. And Furiosa felt selfish, because it wasn't like the Wasteland was ever kind to anyone. It wasn't like nobody else needed rest. She should get up. She should help. She had things to do.

But maybe she could have a few moments more.

"Sleep as much as you need, my girl."

Joe had called her 'My Feisty' and she'd felt queasy ever since when somebody called her 'my' anything, claimed her that way. Even 'My Boss'. So it took Furiosa by surprise when she found herself turning over and tucking her face against the folds of cloth over Gale's hip. When she found herself seeking the contact with Gale's hand. When the words 'My girl' made her feel anchored, safe.  

_ "This is our Furiosa." _

She used to have anger to fit in the space where the Green Place wasn’t, to fit the spaces left empty when everything and everybody was taken away from her. She used to be able to convince herself that surviving was enough, that it was all that her mother had wanted.

Furiosa was not sure what was left if she was too tired to be angry, too careless to survive. 

Too  _ safe  _ for anger or survival to matter.

 

* * *

 

"Can't you make her better?" Austeyr asked, and Gale looked up at the warboy in wonder. He'd seemed the most emotionally rounded of the lot, short of maybe Ace. Then again, she didn't imagine Joe had ever allowed negative emotions that weren't anger or battle rage. Was it any wonder Furiosa's lethargy alarmed him?

“I told her a funny story to cheer her up and even brought her some freshly roasted lizard but she…” the war boy looked helpless. “She just rolled over.” 

“Maybe she's too tired to feel better right now.” Gale said. 

“ But you can just— Why wouldn’t she want to feel better? All she has to do is to get  _ up _ .” He said, distressed and frustrated, “She’s not even interested in going down to the garages, the way she always is when she’s stuck abed. Are you sure there’s nothing wrong? I don’t know what else to  _ do _ .”

“ Sometimes there’s nothing  _ to  _ do.” Gilly huffed out, cleaning her rifle next to Gale. “You just have to let it ride. Can’t skip the road in getting to a place.”

"She just needs some time to get through this, lad," Gale said, resisting the urge to pat the warboy on the shoulder. He seemed so genuinely concerned and upset, but that was the last thing Furiosa needed now. "Don't rush her, she could do with a couple days rest. If you can't give her space, maybe stay out of her way for a while."

The war boy looked at her, devastated. “Just  _ leave  _ her?”

“Not that, no, just… let her be sad. Sometimes that's good.”

"But why would she want to be sad? What's good about that?"

“Haven’t you ever grieved before? It’s just about the final thing you need to do to let something go.”

"Why would I want to? It's pointless waste of time.” Austeyr was practically vibrating in place. “Indulgent. I guess it's alright for a full-life maybe, but not for halflives who ain't got much time to begin with.”

“...even for half-lives though.” And Gale murmured and she could see the words throw the war boy, “And besides, it’s necessary. Surely you have things you feel sad over too. There’s enough time to—”

“ _ There’s nothing I need to grieve _ .” The war boy said loudly, “I’m  _ lucky _ . I should be  _ grateful  _ for how lucky I am.”

They all paused, surprised by his vehemence.

The Vuvalini looked at each other as the echoes died off. “Is that something you feel or something you’ve been told?” Gilly asked quietly.

"Should be down there, scraping by," he gestured out the window, "but the gatekeepers took me up, even though I wasn't the right colour, brought me to the pups. Let me be painted white so I'd look right. Of  _ course  _ I’m grateful."

Austeyr huffed out a breath, looking about to scream, and walked off. 

_Even dead, that blasted Joe still has his touch everywhere,_ Gale thought.


End file.
